Teijin Pharma Limited and Chugai Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. announced that they have concluded a collaboration agreement to develop an anti-diabetic drug ITM-077 (Ipsen development code: BIM 51077, Roche and Chugai development code: R1583) in Japan originated by Ipsen, an innovation driven international specialty pharmaceutical group.

Teijin has been granted by Ipsen rights to co-exclusively develop, sell, market and promote ITM-077 in Japan with Ipsen's global partner under an agreement executed in July 2003 between Teijin and Ipsen. Until now, Teijin has been conducting the development of ITM-077 by itself and now expects, through collaboration with Chugai, to speed up the development, aiming at getting early regulatory approval.

F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd, the strategic alliance partner of Chugai, and Ipsen entered into an agreement for ITM-077 in October 2003, under which Roche obtained an option right to develop and sell ITM-077 worldwide exclusively except for co-exclusive rights in Japan and France. Roche exercised its option in July 2006, and licensed its rights in Japan to Chugai in an agreement executed in December 2006. Chugai is now committed to smoothly start the development of ITM-077 (R1583) in Japan, by closely working with Teijin.

ITM-077 is a long acting analogue of the peptide hormone, GLP-1 (Glucagon like Peptide 1) which increases the level of insulin in response to elevated glucose levels, thus reducing the risk of hypoglycemia. A formulation based on Ipsen's proprietary technology will allow ITM-077 to maintain a longer duration of action and to be administered subcutaneously weekly or biweekly, while the currently available anti-diabetic drugs have to be administered daily. We therefore expect that ITM-077 will be an innovative therapy for patients with type-2 diabetes if the efficacy and safety are proven through the clinical development.

Under the terms the agreement, Teijin and Chugai will jointly develop ITM-077, by sharing the information and data, and the development cost and will independently market and promote it under different trademarks after approval.

ITM-077 is now in phase I in Japan and Roche is conducting phase II outside Japan. Teijin and Chugai are now working together to establish a co-development plan for ITM-077.